


Way up high (where no one can look down on you)

by SylphOfPaperPlanes



Category: American Animals (2018)
Genre: Friends to Lovers, High School, M/M, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-18
Updated: 2018-12-18
Packaged: 2019-09-21 19:56:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,981
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17049587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SylphOfPaperPlanes/pseuds/SylphOfPaperPlanes
Summary: “Then we just can’t get caught.” There it is again, that thousand watt smile focused right on Spencer, making him feel like the sun’s trained on him. From where he’s still gripping Warren’s sleeve, a thumb rubs over the inside of his wrist. There’s a weird amount of promise in that moment, something hiding behind the twinkle in Warren’s eyes. There’s a half second where he’s floating, can’t even feel the pavement under his knees, the rubber of the wheel pressed into his spine, just a strange, soft roar like a solar flare in the back of his mind.Against his better judgement, he barks off a laugh, leans into Warren’s shoulder to muffle the noise. “Just can’t get caught. Right.” That’s all it boils down to, do what they want, say what they want, break out of the rut, break the rules, just don’t get caught.So they don’t.





	Way up high (where no one can look down on you)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [spock](https://archiveofourown.org/users/spock/gifts).



> Hello hello! Written for your lovely Yuletide 2018 prompts for pre-canon Warren/Spencer. I loved them all to bits, and I couldn't help but blend them together. Some info was selectively taken from the 2007 Vanity Fair article on the heist, like Spencer's involvement with soccer, but most fact is thrown out the window for the sake of narrative. I definitely got carried away with this, but I hope you enjoy!

Nobody’s their best in eighth grade. It’s just a fact of life—the sun is going to keep shining, the birds are going to keep singing, and you’ll have to look back at your middle school self and reflect on half the words you ever said between the ages of twelve and fourteen until death comes swiftly and snuffs you out like a candle.

Or at least, that’s what Spencer thinks. Warren calls him overdramatic, but fuck it, he doesn’t disagree.

He remembers sitting in art class, the room booming with the sound of preteens set free, shouting over the soft classical CD the teacher set up before running off to god knows where. It’s their self portrait day, and there’s mirrors set up on every table while everyone halfheartedly tries to sketch themselves, turning their chins left and right, trying to get the right angles while they laugh.

Spencer’s table is blessedly empty, just him and his pencils. He’s almost done, just putting the finishing touches on the hair and the shape of his ears. Frankly, he’d be a hell of a lot closer if half the class stopped going up to him and asking him to do the shading under the eyes, _because he’s so much better at it than them and they can’t afford to fail another assignment in this class, pretty please?_ If he’s honest, he’s past caring. It just takes him a second to do the half-hearted shadow of each cheekbone and then everyone’ll leave him to his own work and, hopefully, a nap in the second half of the period.

He hands back someone’s portrait, the girl with red hair that he has math with, and while she walks away, he rubs at the bruise blooming along his shoulder, hidden under the collar of his hoodie. It shouldn’t be a big deal, barely even hurts, but it’s how dumb it all is that stings the most. _That’s what you get for making a fool of yourself at soccer tryouts_ , he thinks to himself, _slipping on wet grass and landing flat on your face in front of everyone_.

He focuses on the graphite smudged between his fingers, tries to rub it off with the pad of his thumb to no avail. It’s all his mom’s fault, insisting that he try and get into a sport before he goes off to high school, before he gets locked into his nebulous position of future-burnout-in-training.

She didn’t say it in as many words, but Spencer’s sure that’s what she’s saying. Now though, he’s definitely made an ass of himself in front of anyone who’s worth playing with, any coach that would give him a second chance.

”Must be really hard drawing your self-portrait with a pout like that.”

Spencer’s broken out of his internal monologue, looks up from his paper to see who’s talking to him. Lo and behold, it’s the captain of the soccer team, Warren Lipka, all braces-wide smile and bleached hair. There’s a rumor going around that the high school coach guaranteed him a spot on the varsity team next year—a real, bonafide position, not just bench warming. Spencer doesn’t know if he believes a word of it, if only because he can’t reconcile the ball of energy—all dumbass smile and grass-stained jersey—with the image of precision on the field and grace under pressure that everyone seems to talk about when his name comes up in conversation. Sure, people like him ‘cause he’s always shooting off witty one-liners at teachers and charming his way out of detention, but he doesn’t know how Warren could possibly wheel his way into a spot on _varsity_.

Still, he’s sat himself right across from Spencer, resting his chin on his hand like he’s got nothing better to do than sit and chat to the weirdo-loner-artist. Spencer rolls his eyes, doesn’t bother responding as he goes back to working in the individual strands of hair on the paper in front of him.

Warren, apparently, takes the silence as an invitation, leaning up on his elbows to peek at Spencer’s drawing while he talks. “I mean, it looks like you’re doing fine regardless, you’ve got the shading and everything.”

Spencer just shrugs, mumbles. “It’s easy when you’ve got a bunch of practice.” He’s hyper-aware of how tight he’s holding onto the pencil and how dark the lines are coming out on his paper, but he can’t bring himself to ease up on his grip. He doesn’t know why Warren’s belittling him like this, like hasn’t suffered enough through tryouts.

“Speaking of practice,” Warren says, all insistent and sudden. “First soccer practice with the full lineup is next monday. Coach doesn’t like it when people show up late for drills, so we should probably leave History a little early to get changed.”

“I’m not gonna make it onto the team.” Spencer cringes at how deadpan he sounds, but it’s true. He can’t believe Warren is making him say this.

“Not going to make it onto the—dude, _what_?” Warren looks genuinely confused, and he’s got his face all scrunched up with it.

“Do I need to spell it out to you? You saw it. I tripped. Fell flat on my face. Everyone laughed, Warren.”

Warren’s laugh surprises him, all light tones that bubble out at once. “You fell _once_ , dude. You weren’t even wearing cleats, what did you expect? No, you’re gonna get on the team because out on the field it looked like you were actually _thinking_. Everyone else was just panicking and kicking the ball to whoever looked open, but you always had that half second where you were looking a few steps ahead, had an idea where things were going to go. Coach really liked that. We need more of it on the team.”

Spencer’s shocked silent for a long second, still processing the words while they’re ringing in his ears. He feels weirdly vulnerable under Warren’s gaze and his own face staring up at him from the paper.

“What’s the point of this? What do you want?” Spencer squints, places a protective arm in front of his drawing. “How much of the final project do you want me to do for you?”

Warren looks like Spencer just accused him of killing his cat. “Who, me?” he places a hand over his heart, an over-dramatic look of horror plastered on his face. “Spencer Reinhard, you slander my family name with your accusations. Pardon me oh so very much for extending my compliments.”

He sounds so much like a southern bell as he lays the accent on thick, bats his eyelashes and everything, that Spencer can’t help but crack a smile. He feels the tension leave the sharp lines of his shoulders.

“And I do say, Reinhard,” Warren continues, reaching for his portrait with a flourish of the wrist. “I do not, nor shall I ever need any help with art, thank you very much.” He holds up his drawing beside his face, and Spencer’ll be honest, he’d never seen a worse attempt at a human face. He’s not quite sure where the features begin and end, just long, squiggly lines that could put the nose anywhere from the hairline to just below the mouth. He thinks there’s at least one eye in there. Somewhere. Maybe.

It is, without a doubt, the most atrocious thing Spencer’s ever seen.

But Warren’s just sitting there, beaming like an idiot, like the sheet of paper in his hands is the next goddamn Mona Lisa. And in that moment, even with the braces, with the bleach-blonde hair and grass-stained jersey, Spencer feels something light and fluttery in his chest, something he doesn’t have the words to explain.

 

* * *

 

Spencer never got the phrase “getting along like a house on fire” until he started hanging out with Warren. It starts out with walking back to his place after soccer practice because he had the new Madden game while Spencer was still repping his cousin’s old Atari and all four games that he got with it. It snowballs though, spending Friday afternoons together, then sleepovers into Saturday mornings, wandering around town on the Sunday mornings that Warren can beg his way out of church. It’s no time at all before he’s covered in the same grass-stains and strange bruises that Warren’s got from the field, before they’re both on varsity and shoving each other around after team huddles and laughing at each other’s jokes between goals and drill practices.

Time bends in weird ways when he’s around Warren, doesn’t even realize that four years pass like they’re nothing until he looks in the mirror one morning after a shower, notices the way his shoulders filled out, the way his jaw’s gotten sharper, the way his eyes are lit up with something he can’t put words to. He doesn’t know what to do about, how to feel, so he just shrugs on a shirt, takes care not to grab his sweatshirt from last night that still reeks of weed on his way way out.

His parents’ view on Warren was...complicated. Fuck, complicated was an understatement with them, anyway. Were they happy that Spencer was on the soccer team? Yes. Were they happy that he’d been making friends? Yes. Were they happy with the fact that he spent too much of his time with this one friend, staying out until three in the morning doing god knows what, leaning into his touch under the fog over his head when they stumbled back in? Well—well, they didn’t need to know more about the last one than they’d already probably guessed. Spencer’s not sure he wants to much either.

So when Spencer’s rushing to get out the door for school—‘cause it’s a twenty minute walk and he’s already ten minutes behind schedule—he shouts over his shoulder at his mom that he’s leaving, throws the door open, and nearly walks face first into the one and only Warren Lipka. He’s hit with the smell of burnt coffee and twizzlers (“breakfast of champions,” he insisted one morning before class, but Spencer’s still a sceptic), all manic energy and surefire confidence leaning against the doorframe.

“”It’s about time, dude,” he says in a rush, pulling Spencer outside by the shoulder, letting the door slam shut behind him. “Been waiting here for like, half an hour.”

Spencer instinctively shushes him, pulls him around the side of the house until they’re out of view of the front windows. He doesn’t know why they’re hiding, but he’s got that swirling feeling in his gut, the one he gets when he knows he’s about to do something incredibly dumb, probably going to get him in trouble. Vaguely, he realizes how often that feeling’s associated with Warren.

“What’re you doing here?” He finally says, taking in his wide smile and distinct absence of his backpack. “You have a car. And class in ten minutes.”

“Didn’t you hear? Got suspended.” Warren bounces on the balls of his feet, hands in his pockets. For all the world, he doesn’t look half as ashamed as he should be, saying that. “Out of school for two days, they caught me for the thing.”

“The thing with the stapler and the mascot costume?”

“No, the thing with the bolt cutters in the locker room.”

“You said you couldn’t get caught for that.”

“And they said the Titanic couldn’t sink, but they’re still making moves about it hitting a fucking iceberg like a century years later. Anyways,” Warren drums his fingers on the drainpipe screwed onto the side of the house, the sound echoing uncomfortably in the quiet morning. “We should get going. Your mom is gonna leave to drop off your sister any minute.”

“Leave? We?” Spencer feels like he’s running ten steps behind pace through this entire conversation, eyes still bleary from sleep, hair still wet from the shower. “Warren, _I’ve_ still got class.”

“Not today you don’t,” Warren says over his shoulder, already making his way to his usual parking spot around the corner. Spencer has to half-jog to keep up. “Finally have a day off, so we’re going to to Cincinnati, to that art museum you really like. It’s over an hour drive though, so we’ve got to get going like, now.”

“”Warren? Warren—” Spencer’s still half a pace behind, catching on Warren’s sleeve to slow him down. “You’ve still got your learner’s permit, we can’t go _out of the fucking state_ instead of going to school—” he cuts himself off when he hears the front door of his house slam shut, pulls the both of them behind Warren’s beat-up car.

“Then we just can’t get caught.” There it is again, that thousand watt smile focused right on Spencer, making him feel like the sun’s trained on him. From where he’s still gripping Warren’s sleeve, a thumb rubs over the inside of his wrist. There’s a weird amount of promise in that moment, something hiding behind the twinkle in Warren’s eyes. There’s a half second where he’s floating, can’t even feel the pavement under his knees, the rubber of the wheel pressed into his spine, just a strange, soft roar like a solar flare in the back of his mind.

Against his better judgement, he barks off a laugh, leans into Warren’s shoulder to muffle the noise. “Just can’t get caught. Right.” That’s all it boils down to, do what they want, say what they want, break out of the rut, break the rules, just don’t get caught.

 

So they don’t.

 

* * *

 

They fall into it like they fall into everything.

“Stay still,” Spencer says, half his attention on the sketchbook on his lap, the other on Warren, lying flat on the rug in the living room.

It’s late. Probably too late for Spencer to be out on a school night, but Warren’d sounded so sad when he realized that he’d have to miss their usual Saturday movie night because his travel team was going on to nationals. ( _Sure, I get to go to New Jersey for a week or whatever,_ he’d said over the phone, voice dripping with annoyance, _but if you’re not there, then it’s just a bunch of idiots punching each other and not letting anyone in the hotel sleep. It sucks._ ) It was probably some guilt tactic, Warren being bitter that Spencer dropped soccer to focus on his art, to get his portfolio together for colleges to look at. They were both busy with applications and the last vestiges of schoolwork before everything stops mattering, so busy that moments together felt special and far-between. But the guilt-tripping stopped working ages ago, he thinks. The puppy eyes barely even get to him anymore. Barely.

And so, completely of his own volition, Spencer walked halfway across town, picked something up from Blockbuster, and set himself firmly down on Warren’s couch while his parents were out doing god knows what. Warren made fun of him for not driving over, especially with the way the temperature’s dropping fast at night again, but he’d only just gotten his license and is too chicken to pass any of the police cars with his mom in the passenger seat, much less on his own. Besides, he’s got canvases in the trunk he doesn’t want Warren seeing, the big ones he’s done up with sketchy gestural figures, plucked straight from the last of Warren’s soccer practices that didn’t conflict with his life drawing classes. He doesn’t know why he’s hiding them, just that it feel wrong to show something unfinished to him and face that half-confused stare, that slight tilt of the head as he tries to puzzle out how the shapes come together into figures.

The movie that they put on drones on behind him, the bright light from the screen throwing the shadows of the room into strange relief. There’s something about the way that Warren’s outlined in front of the television, holding the book for their English class right in front of his face. All he can see is the strange kind of tension in his shoulders and the way that the blue-grey light plays over his hair. Spencer loves it all, wishes he had his old polaroid camera with him so he could get a picture of it, could paint it up later with the set of acrylics he got for Christmas last year.

Still, at the sound of Spencer’s voice, Warren looks up, runs his hand through his hair, bites his lip. “What’s that?” he asks, all air of innocence like he didn’t hear what Spencer’s been saying. Whatever effect that had been there is gone, fluttering away as a new scene comes up on the screen and a car passes by, throwing the headlights in through the window.

“Motherfucker, I said stay still,” he shoots back, trying to hold back a laugh. He kicks at Warren’s legs when he tries to sit up. “The moment was perfect. Could’ve been my AP Art final project, right fuckin’ there.”

“Bullshit.” Warren’s got a smirk on the size of Mississippi. “You see me every goddamn day, just draw me then.” He ducks, expecting the throw pillow that Spencer chucks at him. “Hey, hey! You know I’m right, Reinhard.”

“It was the lighting!” Spencer laughs back, holding his sketchbook protectively when the pillow comes sailing back. “And the posture! And like, a thousand other things that are _gone_.” he knows he’s being a little overdramatic, is laying on thicker and thicker with every list item, but hanging around Warren Lipka’ll do that to you, will put words in your mouth and cadence under your tongue that you never thought you’d have the guts to speak.

“Fine, fine.” Warren sighs, puts down his battered copy of _Great Gatsby_ , as though he’d actually been reading any of it. He strikes some dramatic pose, puts a hand behind his head and leans on his side, hip cocked. Some part of Spencer’s brain is reminded of some work by Titian they’d learned in art history the month before, a pastoral scene in daylight rather than backlit by some action movie. “This better, Michelangelo?” Warren drawls with a roll of his eyes.

Spencer doesn’t want to admit that yes, yes it is better, miles better even, though he can’t place why. Maybe it's the shadow stretching out on the carpet, the way his gaze is just the little bit challenging as it is light-hearted, the inch of skin that shows where his shirt rides up, the way he bites his lip so slightly when he laughs—

His mouth goes dry, his hands itch to sketch it all, but all he can do is force out another half laugh, kick out again to knock him over.

Warren’s expecting it this time though, dodges and reaches out, wraps a hand around Spencer’s ankle, leaning back with the motion until he finds himself falling off the couch, sketchbook clattering to the floor somewhere out of his line of sight while Warren’s reaching out to punch him in the shoulder. Spencer retaliates with an elbow toward the throat, and then they’re in the thick of it, laughing over the soundtrack while they’re wrestling, all sharp kneecaps and strong shoulders, the heels of their palms weaponized, and the carpet beneath them leaving the barest scratches as they move atop it. Warren’s fast, but Spencer’s always been able to predict his next step based on a hundred little things, the way his eyes flicker over everything, the way his muscles twitch under his hoodie.

It’s not until he’s got Warren pinned, wrists against the carpet, thighs slung over his stomach, face hovering just a few inches above the other’s that he notices that Warren’s barely breathing. When the scene changes again on the screen, his face is thrown into sharp relief, the bright white light illuminating his blown pupils, the way his lips are barely parted, the rise and fall of his chest brought to a stattico stutter, shallow like the flutter of hummingbird’s wings under Spencer’s body.

His first thought is _this isn’t supposed to happen like this_ , followed by the rush of an unnamable emotion, something strange and soft in his chest at the idea that he’s the one who's got Warren like this, barely pressing back against the pressure on his wrists, saying something very pointed in the downward of his chin, the spark of confidence in his gaze fading into something delicate and shaky.

His second thought is a more pressing, panicked _this isn’t supposed to happen like this_ , all neon signs, back-out-of-this-now, wake-up-tomorrow-’cause-this-is-all-a-dream, and leans back, tries to get out Warren’s space until he realizes where he’s putting his weight and hears him _keen_ low in his throat beneath him.

He’s pretty sure they’re both beet red and he feels how bad his palms are sweating against Warren’s. There’s a split second where he’s planning on just talking it all off, an understanding between friends that things just _happen_ , until a laugh bubbles up from deep in his chest, surprises him with how loud it sounds in the room. It almost makes it worse, the way he can’t stop laughing—can’t move from where he’s frozen in place, head hanging, hands brought up to cover his mouth—until Warren’s in it with him, the both of them curled around each other just like that, laughing like they just pulled the biggest prank on the universe together.

At some point, he rolls off Warren, flat onto his back, right next to him with one of his hands clutched in his own while giggles still rack through his chest. Warren’s right beside him, no shame etched into his expression, just the sharp lines of his smile, something pure and honest in the space of exhaustion while his eyes are still pinched shut with laughter, his hand tight around Spencer’s. This close, Spencer swears he can count his individual eyelashes, every little nick and scar he’s gotten over the years. He smells like the soccer pitch and cut grass and sweat and sunlight and the laundry detergent his mom asks him to pick up for her after practice and—

He decides he likes this angle too, likes it a whole lot. He doesn’t even think, just leans in, presses his lips to Warren’s.

There’s a half second where everything’s frozen, suspended in place, before Warren lets out a sigh against his lips, smiles even wider than Spencer thought possible, and kisses back with feeling. They’d both kissed girls before, talked about it lying on Spencer’s bed around two in the morning after one of the team parties, but this is different somehow, better, like puzzle pieces fitting together. There’s so much going on, Spencer’s hand hovering just above Warren’s pulse, sliding across his jaw, anchoring itself in his hair when he parts his lips, runs his tongue across his bottom lip. It’s all messy, fluid, perfect in the way that nothing is, just because in that moment it’s _them_.

There’s a moment that they break, and he holds back another half-laugh at the way Warren’s still got on that goofy smile that he’s worn for the past five years, brighter than the fucking sun in the dark room, like Spencer’s hung the goddamn stars and the moon for him in his living room.

It’s not just that he’s the recipient of it all. No, he loves knowing that he’s the one who caused it, that he’s the reason they’re lying like this on the floor, wrapped up in each other. He doesn’t know what’s happening next, but he’s got his face buried in Warren’s hoodie because it feels right, with everything leading up to this moment for god knows how long.

It doesn’t matter what happens, he thinks, doesn’t matter how anything ends up in the coming days, months, years, because he has this.

They have this.

**Author's Note:**

> Kudos and comments are always appreciated!


End file.
